A day in 3 parts

I was bragging to my mother this morning about what beautiful weather we’ve been having here in our mountaintop town. Wouldn’t you know it? The skies heard me.

Part I
The morning was gorgeous, summery weather. I walked in the shola with Iddli, listening to cicadas playing their tiny violins, watching the sunlight filter idly through leaves of all shades, sizes, and shapes. We descended from the foresty trail to the boardwalk by the lake and saw water lilies explode with joy into the daylight, riffing off the jazz played across the water by the wind and light combo. I delighted in the knowledge that I can take this walk anytime I want to, and that I get to live in this place and be a part of the music of it all. My heart lifted, my laughter trilled.

Part II
After my walk I went to K’s house, where eleven children would soon be coming to play, little girls from an orphanage nearby. K has three children of her own, so it was promising to be quite the madhouse once the others arrived. K’s husband, G, had blown up the paddling pool before leaving for work in the morning and there was a pile of tiny bathing suits ready for use. When the little girls arrived (they’re all between three and five years old) I thought I’d never be able to keep them straight. They each had twin pigtails fastened high into short wavy hair with matching little bobby pins keeping the strays in place. K introduced me to each one as they got out of the taxi van that had brought them. The little girls looked at me earnestly, wariness apparent in their shy bright orbs.

We played around for a bit in the child’s paradise that is K’s garden. There is a big trampoline, a jungle gym for climbing, three swings, and a sandbox. K and G’s children pranced and prattled, they swung and dangled, chattering the whole time to one another. The visiting little girls maintained their serious demeanors. I pushed C and A on the swings. A’s eyes grew big as I pulled her toward me, preparing to let her go. The fear evaporated into delight when she realized she wasn’t going to tip backwards out of the swing. We giggled to one another. They had accepted me.

Soon it was time to get in the paddling pool. The little girls were getting bathing suits put on them by every available adult, and were then being placed in the pool. They didn’t quite know what to do with themselves. K and G’s children were flopping around, splashing and bubbling. The other little girls were standing still in the water, getting used to the feeling of being wet.

It didn’t take long, though, for everything to degenerate into the fun insanity it should be when there are over ten children in a paddling pool. The sound: laughter, giggling, splashing water, kersplunks and hahas. The sight: pigtails bouncing, bottles of all shapes and sizes being filled up and then dumped (usually over someone’s head—sometimes one’s own head), the joyful but Sisyphean task of filling one bottle with another when you’re hardly more than a toddler.

I fell in love with several of the little girls. Who could not love the potbellied B, her smile unabashed and her cuddles as tightly wound as her curls? What about serious little T, who finally laughed when I pushed her on the swing and tickled her feet as they came toward me? And of course there was C, who never wanted to let me put her down (the feeling was mutual) and who bounced like trampolining was her calling.

Lunch was served. It was time for me to go.

Part III
Lunch at school is one of my favorite things. It’s not the food. No, no, it’s definitely not the food that makes it so good. It’s seeing the people, my friends and former colleagues, and chatting outside while the mist collects across the way. We sit outside in a walled off corner near the flag green. We chat and kvetch and watch as the sky turns from chlorine pool blue to milky thick white. Today there are even raindrops plooping down onto our stainless steel trays, getting the fruit salad soggy.

Will, Y and I wander inside for coffee as the sky turns from white to grey, and as the grumbles start groaning across the land. By the time we’ve drunk a cup, the grumbles have turned to shouts, cracking shrieks of the biggest whip ever, a whip used to drive bulls, or more likely bison, across the South Indian sky.

I think to myself that I am in a different place entirely than the town I wandered through this morning. In one day, just a few hours, I have inhabited several types of town. I live in them all, but they are not the same place.

I wend my way through the school, trying to stay dry under a maze of covered walkways. I get to the library, which seems the most natural place to be when it’s raining. The books feel like home, as warm and comforting as a cup of tea by the fire. When I leave, the rain has picked up rather than slowing down, and I run to the stockroom to buy an umbrella. The one I get is huge, you could probably set it up comfortably at the beach to avoid sunburn, and the thrill runs through me like it always does when the rain is heavy and my umbrella keeps me dry.

To me, there’s hardly anything better than an umbrella. It’s the ultimate home away from home. It protects me, provides me shelter and comfort. I even love the word. The umbrella I’ve just bought is so wide that I can rest the pole against one shoulder and still stay dry. I feel like Madeleine, or some other storybook character with boots and a yellow jacket. I feel like Fred Astaire. I kick my sandaled feet through puddles and laugh for the umpteenth time today.

I am like the little girls were earlier. It took me awhile to loosen up in the rain, to ditch my propriety and feel the reckless abandon that comes to us humans in the water. The little girls needed some time before they could allow themselves to dance through the pool, before they really (quite literally) let their hair down. Now, just an hour or so later, here I was splashing and giggling and getting my Ali Baba pants quite drenched, thank you very much.